Newsweek's 'Wisdom' of 2009: Jon Stewart is Half Murrow, Half Carson, While Beck is a 'Weepy Wingnut'

Newsweek’s year-end "Conventional Wisdom 2009" page recycles the magazine’s usual distilled liberalism in a sentence. In this case, there were two sentences: their version of the CW and "Think Again," which was often just an added puff of praise or an added insult in bolder type. Start with the cable-talk stars.

Jon Stewart (up arrow):

"Fake news" king puts mainstream gasbags to shame. Edward R. Murrow meets Johnny Carson.

Glenn Beck (down arrow):

Weepy wingnut calls Obama racist, un-American. No, that would be you, Glenn.

Isn’t Jon Stewart a snarky wingnut? Yes, but so are the pundits at Newsweek. Their take on politicians is also predictable. The only up arrow to a conservative went to Sarah Palin, perhaps as journalistic penance for their nasty running-shorts cover a few weeks ago:

Flip-flopping quitter gov has best-selling book. Is she running for prez or for Oprah’s seat?

The other conservative "honorees" drew down arrows and hateful prose:

Cheney: Rottweiler in Winter accuses Obama of treason. Didn’t he call attacking wartime prez unpatriotic?

Dobbs: ‘Birther’ leaves CNN for politics. Let’s see his certificate.

The most sugary praises were saved for the liberals.

Teddy: Captain of the Senate makes his final voyage. For the have-nots, he was the greatest brother of all.

Obama: Takes on wrecked economy, two wars, health care. His reward: more popular in Europe than in U.S.

Michelle: Making White House the "people’s house." Watch out for East Wing overreachers.

Hillary: Old CW: Her husband will get in the way. New CW: Best sec. of state since George Marshall.